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We Jews make up 0.2 per cent of the world’s population but have won 22 per cent of all the Nobel prizes ever awarded. And we have not done this with a tailwind. Mark Twain thought the reason Jews tended to do so well in business was above-average honesty. Jewish success has been so extravagantly out of proportion to their population that their finest gentile supporters have long sought reasons. Clive James, wondering about our influence in the arts, felt exclusion may have had its benefits. ‘Whole generations of Jewish literati were denied the opportunity of wasting their energies on compiling abstruse doctoral theses. They were driven instead to journalism,

I can’t say I was gobsmacked to read that Miley Cyrus and Naomi Campbell seemed more interested in each other’s company than in their fans when they held a ‘meet and greet’ in London to sign copies of their new single. Some fans complained, accusing Cyrus of ignoring them in favour of chatting with Campbell. Somewhat stung, Cyrus posted nine videos on social media of herself and Campbell pressing the flesh with the little people: ‘To everyone who came out to celebrate our single, we love you.’ Hmm. We’ve been here before. Celebrities promoting their product can be snooty enough when interviewed one-on-one, but put two of them together in

When my father passed away suddenly in April, I committed to wearing only black until after the funeral. I’m still struggling to properly articulate my feelings, but wearing black seems like a mark – albeit a feeble one – of respect to the memory of the best man I will ever know, and a small hold-out against fully returning to real life. I’m obviously not the first to wear black in mourning; the colour has held a near-mystical appeal for millennia. The Romans used to don a toga pulla when grieving. In the early medieval period, black symbolised malevolence, but by the 12th century the colour was associated with dignity,

As a child, superhero comics felt like a guilty secret – their devotees part of a secret society who found refuge in the musty, cardboard-scented havens of comics conventions. Back then, girls were absent, dressing up was unheard of, and even children weren’t especially welcome. So when a gang of teenage girls not only turned up to Avengers: Endgame but openly wept at Iron Man’s death, I felt something close to vindication – and perhaps a twinge of envy for today’s young fans, who can indulge their obsessions out in the open. Those same musty rooms of old cardboard and grown men was what I was anticipating when I booked

A woman crying elicits sympathy – even if, à la Rachel from Accounts, she is some kind of nightmare soap-opera figure from the suburbs of south London. When a woman we do not know bursts into tears in public our gut reaction is to assume she must have a good reason for doing so. She has, until proven otherwise, right on her side. And even if she does not, it does not usually matter. She may be wrong in terms of the rational truth, but she is right instinctively. Otherwise she would not have cried – would she? Let us be clear: women often cry, men rarely do. I speak